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Head-to-head · Stablecoins

USDS (Sky) vs TUSD (TrueUSD) USDS (Sky) leads by 2 points.

USDS (Sky) scores 2 points above TUSD (TrueUSD), led by redemption right exercised and seizure and upgrade authority. USDS (Sky) ranks #10 and TUSD (TrueUSD) #11 of 11 published stablecoins. Every term of the gap is on the ledger below; the inputs are on the audit receipt.

USDS (Sky)55
TUSD (TrueUSD)53
Scores are out of 100; published scores fall within 41–99 · ranks #10 and #11 of 11
Methodology v2026.10.18Ranking snapshot Evidence verified through 4 published criteria5 score dimensions Receipt #cc-VS-USDS-SKY-VS-TUSD-TRUEUSD-bdf21d52
Published verdictRanking snapshot 3 November 2026

USDS (Sky) leads by 2 points

USDS (Sky) scores 2 points above TUSD (TrueUSD), led by redemption right exercised and seizure and upgrade authority.

USDS (Sky) #10 of 1155
TUSD (TrueUSD) #11 of 1153
Scores are out of 100; published scores fall within 41–99; a bar is empty at 41 and full at 99.
Why, term by termUSDS (Sky) leads on 2 of 4 published criteria; TUSD (TrueUSD) on 1. The terms sum to the gap.
TermUSDS (Sky)TUSD (TrueUSD)WeightPoints
Redemption right exercised4/103/106.7+1.7for USDS (Sky)+0.9 of 32
Reserve and assurance scope1/102/105.8−1.5for TUSD (TrueUSD)−0.8 of 32
Seizure and upgrade authority5/103/104.3+2.2for USDS (Sky)+1.2 of 32
Net of the terms+2.5
Criteria roundingThe criteria block is rounded to whole points before it is spread−0.2
Reproduced gap+2.3
Published gapAfter score rounding and bounds — see the note below5553+2.0

Weight is in points of the 86-point weighted total. Points are score points of the gap between the two.

  • A row-above bound on one row means the criterion arithmetic does not reproduce the displayed gap exactly.
Quick facts

At a glance

2 of 3 rows read the same for both.
FactUSDS (Sky)TUSD (TrueUSD)
PricingSnapshotMINT/REDEEM FEES AND MINIMUMS ARE NOT IN ANY BINDING DOCUMENT. The Skybase International Terms of Use (https://docs.sky.money/legal/skybase-international/terms-of-use, "Version: 2.0 | Last Modified: 1 September 2026", fetched 29 September 2026) is the silent page: 0 occurrences of "redeem" or "redemption", and no fee schedule or minimum of any kind for acquiring or exiting USDS. The only published pricing sits in the protocol documentation and on-chain. Sky Protocol Docs, https://developers.sky.money/protocol/tokens/usds/ (redirects to developers.skyeco.com, fetched 29 September 2026), DAI USDS Converter: "Converts DAI to USDS at a fixed ratio of 1:1 and vice versa." / "No fees assessed." / "Fees cannot be enabled on this route in the future." Sky Protocol Docs, https://developers.sky.money/guides/psm/litepsm/ (fetched 29 September 2026): "The tin fee is assessed on all sellGem transactions, and the tout fee is assessed on all buyGem transactions. Both tin and tout values are set by Sky Ecosystem governance." and "All users, both public and authorized, can only swap up to the DAI and USDC balances held by LitePSM-DAI-USDC." CURRENT VALUES, all read at ONE Ethereum block, 26,082,220 (2026-09-29T09:26:59Z) via https://ethereum-rpc.publicnode.com: LitePSM-DAI-USDC 0xf6e72Db5454dd049d0788e411b06CfAF16853042 tin() = 0 and tout() = 0; LitePSMWrapper-USDS-USDC 0xA188EEC8F81263234dA3622A406892F3D630f98c tin() = 0 and tout() = 0. No minimum size is published or enforced on either route; the practical ceiling is module inventory — 4,133,680,653.128042 USDC in the Pocket 0x37305B1cD40574E4C5Ce33f8e8306Be057fD7341 at that block against a USDS totalSupply of 6,672,590,279.74 (label: on-chain reads, true only at the stamped block). Marketing counterpart on https://sky.money/ (fetched 29 September 2026), reworded since August: "Swap anytime. No fees, no slippage."MINT/REDEEM FEES — TrueUSD Terms of Use, https://app.tusd.io/terms-of-use (a JavaScript app; the Terms text is served from https://app-cdn.tusd.io/static/js/4464.9b870b98.chunk.js, the same build as in August, fetched 29 September 2026): "You are responsible for all on-chain transaction costs associated with on-chain transfers of any TrueUSD. The Company does not charge any Fees for minting or redeeming any TrueUSD and does not charge any on-chain transaction fees in addition to the blockchain-specific transaction fees associated with such transfers." HOMEPAGE ECHO — https://tusd.io (fetched 29 September 2026): "Additionally, TUSD does not charge any fees for its minting and redemption." MINIMUM — Terms of Use: "We reserve the right to prohibit wire submissions of fiat currency or redemption requests of TrueUSD if the total amount submitted or requested is less than US$1,000." — a discretionary floor, not a stated hard minimum: the issuer reserves the right to REFUSE below US$1,000 rather than promising to accept at or above it. ROUNDING — Terms of Use: "All TrueUSD tokens will be rounded down to the nearest amount of the lowest circulating denomination of the underlying fiat currency, upon redemption." WHAT THE FREE FEE BUYS — the same Terms: "The Platform is only intended to facilitate such mints and redemptions and the Company does not guarantee any right of redemption or exchange of TrueUSD tokens for US Dollars." and "In order to cause TrueUSD tokens to be issued or redeemed by the Company, you must be a verified customer of the Company." SILENT ON: no page loaded on 29 September 2026 states a redemption SLA, a settlement window, a banking-partner wire fee, or any maximum; no separate fee-schedule page exists. TYPED RATE (label, not a quote): spreadPct = 0 — the issuer charges no mint or redemption fee; only network gas applies.
Asset coverageEditorial——
Region fitSnapshotglobalglobal
From the published criteria

Which should you pick?

USDS (Sky)

55#10 of 11
Leads
Pick it when
Pick USDS (Sky) if redemption right exercised matters most — it scores 4/10 to TUSD (TrueUSD)'s 3/10 there (weight 28).
Strength
Seizure and upgrade authority — 5/10
Tradeoff
That nobody is on the other side. Sky's binding Terms of Use (Version 2.0, last modified 1 September 2026) contain zero occurrences of the words "redeem" or "redemption", and the same document states that Skybase International "is not a subsidiary, agent, or representative of the Sky Protocol" and that neither it nor its affiliates are "party to any transaction on the Sky Protocol" — so there is no entity a holder can present USDS to for a dollar, and no insolvency rank to hold. The par exit everyone actually uses is a swap into USDC through a governance-owned module, and Sky's own protocol documentation says "Governance can set either tin or tout to the value of type(uint256).max , halting sellGem and buyGem transactions respectively on the LitePSM. Transactions would be halted for both public and authorized users." while sky.money's homepage advertises "Swap anytime. No fees, no slippage." Worse than the fee switch: the DAI leg's converter is genuinely immutable, but it mints through UsdsJoin, whose mint call is auth-gated on the token, so a single deny() from the pause proxy severs that route too. A buyer who read only the homepage would learn none of this.

TUSD (TrueUSD)

53#11 of 11
Pick it when
Pick TUSD (TrueUSD) if reserve and assurance scope matters most — it scores 2/10 to USDS (Sky)'s 1/10 there (weight 24).
Strength
Redemption right exercised — 3/10
Tradeoff
That the reserve backing it holds zero US Treasury Bills. TUSD's own assurance report, dated 19 August 2026 and signed by Moore CPA Limited, lists 'US Treasury Bills $0', '$78,900.88' of cash, and $501,850,000 — 99.98% — as a single balance at First Digital Trust Limited, which the same report says 'has invested all or substantially all of the collateral in other instruments to generate yield, which cannot be readily convertible to cash, and are subject to ongoing legal proceedings.' Techteryx has a worldwide freezing order from the DIFC Courts over up to US$456 million and says it has arranged separate 'alternative liquidity' so that tokens 'in public circulation' can still be redeemed — while the same report discloses that 412,585,497.92 of the 494,515,082.75 tokens issued are held by Techteryx itself. A close second: the Terms of Use you agree to name no company at all — 'Company' is defined as 'us', and a search of the full Terms for 'Ltd', 'Limited', 'LLC', 'Inc.' and 'Techteryx' returns zero hits — and those same Terms state that 'the Company does not guarantee any right of redemption or exchange of TrueUSD tokens for US Dollars.'
Self-identify in 10 seconds

Which one is actually for you?

USDS (Sky)Leads

Choose USDS (Sky) if redemption right exercised matters most

  • Redemption right exercised: 4/10 against 3/10 for TUSD (TrueUSD) (weight 28)
  • Seizure and upgrade authority: 5/10 against 3/10 for TUSD (TrueUSD) (weight 18)
TUSD (TrueUSD)

Choose TUSD (TrueUSD) if reserve and assurance scope matters most

  • Reserve and assurance scope: 2/10 against 1/10 for USDS (Sky) (weight 24)
Criterion by criterion

Scorecard

Published criteria · weight in points of 868 of 8 cells scored. Strength is read from the evidence file; the weight is the published one. Methodology

Counterparty and insolvency rank

weight 7.2 of 86Tie
USDS (Sky)1 out of 10
TUSD (TrueUSD)1 out of 10

Redemption right exercised

by 1 of 10weight 6.7 of 86USDS (Sky) leads
USDS (Sky)4 out of 10
TUSD (TrueUSD)3 out of 10

Reserve and assurance scope

by 1 of 10weight 5.8 of 86TUSD (TrueUSD) leads
USDS (Sky)1 out of 10
TUSD (TrueUSD)2 out of 10

Seizure and upgrade authority

by 2 of 10weight 4.3 of 86USDS (Sky) leads
USDS (Sky)5 out of 10
TUSD (TrueUSD)3 out of 10

Score dimensions

weights sum to 86

The published score is five dimensions, each weighted for the category. "Published criteria" is the criteria block above; the other four are the engine's own terms — availability, friction, trust record, measured data. Each bar is one side's points out of that dimension's maximum; the weight beside the name is its points of the 86-point weighted total. The published criteria above can fill 24 of the block’s 30. A weight marked “constant here” belongs to a dimension every ranked product in the category holds at the same value: it still counts in the total, and it orders nothing here.

Availabilityweight 20 of 86 · constant here
USDS (Sky)14/20TUSD (TrueUSD)14/20
Tie
Published criteriaweight 30 of 86
USDS (Sky)6.1/30TUSD (TrueUSD)5.2/30
USDS (Sky) leads
Frictionweight 10 of 86 · constant here
USDS (Sky)2.7/10TUSD (TrueUSD)2.7/10
Tie
Trust recordweight 8 of 86 · constant here
USDS (Sky)3.2/8TUSD (TrueUSD)3.2/8
Tie
Measured dataweight 18 of 86 · constant here
USDS (Sky)8.3/18TUSD (TrueUSD)8.3/18
Tie
Decision rulePublished order

Choose USDS (Sky) unless the term TUSD (TrueUSD) leads on is the one you are buying.

Pick TUSD (TrueUSD) if reserve and assurance scope matters most — it scores 2/10 to USDS (Sky)'s 1/10 there (weight 24).

The published order weighs every criterion the same way for everyone. To weigh them your way, run .

From the published order

Next best action

If this isn't your case

Other matchups worth comparing

How you can lose money here, and what the ranking scores
  • Control failure: a key or vote changes the rules, freezes or mints.
    Scored by Who can freeze, burn or replace your balance — and have they? · 18% (USDS (Sky) 5/10, TUSD (TrueUSD) 3/10)
  • Insolvency failure: the firm or issuer that owes you cannot pay.
    Scored by Who exactly owes you the dollar, and where do you rank when they fail? · 30% (USDS (Sky) 1/10, TUSD (TrueUSD) 1/10)
    Scored by What is really behind it, and what did the third party actually opine on? · 24% (USDS (Sky) 1/10, TUSD (TrueUSD) 2/10)
  • Exit failure: you cannot get out at par, on time, or with what is yours.
    Scored by Can the person actually holding it get a dollar back at par — and has anyone, at size? · 28% (USDS (Sky) 4/10, TUSD (TrueUSD) 3/10)
Not assessed by this ranking: Contract failure, Custody failure, Regulatory failure, Information failure. A high place says nothing about these; the Methodology tab says what each means.
Questions

Frequently asked questions

USDS (Sky) scores 2 points above TUSD (TrueUSD), led by redemption right exercised and seizure and upgrade authority. Published scores, out of 100: USDS (Sky) 55 (rank 10 of 11 stablecoins), TUSD (TrueUSD) 53 (rank 11 of 11).

Related pages

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Written and reviewed by Founder
Reviewed Next review by Methodology v2026.10.18
How this page is reviewed

Reviewed means both products compared here was read against its sources on or after that date; every ranked category is re-read at least every 45 days. Models research, extract and parse. A deterministic engine ranks. Every quote passes an adversarial refute pass.

Accountable for this review: Mathias Siemonsmeier, Founder.

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